I hate zero tolerance. It’s a counsel of despair. You toss kids out of school. Then you toss them into jail. Nothing changes, nothing gets better.

And I hate how you’re made to feel icky and mealy-mouthed if you’re one of the root-causes people instead of the firm-response, zero-tolerance types — as if the choice is between being a social worker and a tough cop. But I also dislike saying: Both approaches are needed. It sounds, um, mealy-mouthed.

Here’s my view: Once you reach the point with an issue where you have to apply zero tolerance, mandatory minimum sentences, three strikes and you’re out, no discretion or creative solutions allowed, then the situation has probably deteriorated so far that no good can result, it will only worsen.

It’s like most conflict situations. When the parties start throwing blows, or head to court with lawyers, the best you can do is get it over with, try to minimize further escalation, then backtrack as fast as you can to implement changes so it won’t happen all over. That’s where root causes come in.

The zero-tolerance policy in Ontario schools, with mandatory expulsion for a list of violations under the Safe Schools Act, is now being reviewed. By the way, when did schools get to be about safety instead of learning? During a decade of Mike Harris Tories. They slashed funds and programs, abused teachers, dropped “frills” like art and music along with after-school stuff, and cut staff such as counsellors who watched for trouble coming.

Then, when the schools got tense, they legislated zero tolerance and threw kids out. So what do those kids do? Who do they do it with? Where do they hang? Anybody guessing they might make trouble, and get into it? It wasn’t a safe-schools policy, it was anger management for raging Tories.

And if the next 50 Cent is one of those expelled trouble-makers, would you berate him for writing about his experience and make sure he couldn’t enter Canada?

What’s the alternative? Well, in younger grades, if a kid gets roughed up in the schoolyard, he’s supposed to “tell an adult.” I didn’t use to get this: Shouldn’t kids stand up for themselves? But here’s what can happen. The adult looks into it and talks to other staff. Is there a developmental issue, or a home problem?

Then a teacher or principal talks to the aggressor, making clear what’s unacceptable. Maybe an apology comes out of it, a genuine one. The kids see they are part of a community with empathetic, empowered adults who gather information and don’t just punish, they balance the elements and act to fix things so it won’t happen again. The kids get more confident and learn to deal with each other, kindly but within rules, assured of a supportive environment. There’s your root-cause approach.

It’s not so different from international violence. Once a 9/11 happens, the perpetrators have to be tracked down, to stop them from more of the same, and I’m not against using dirty means to do it. But don’t fool yourself, the counteroffensive will simply make things worse, and lead to more 9/11s, as it already has, until changes are made in the situation that produced the violence in the first place. Dealing with root causes is not a luxury for liberals to slosh about in. It’s the only effective solution.

Unless you have another view of human nature. These debates — zero tolerance versus root causes etc. — often conceal philosophical divides. Maybe you think human nature is violent, it’s just a matter of who hits first. Or that violence inheres in certain “others” — blacks, Muslims, kids. Especially kids, generations without end. Isn’t it always about youth: their violence, their hair, their piercing, their gangs, their music, their violence . . .

But if violence is a youth problem, riddle me this: Why is Canada one of the nations that still lets parents and teachers hit their kids? It’s the only exception to assault in the Criminal Code (Section 43). The Supreme Court upheld it a year ago, though it set limits: not under the age of two, not teens, not upside the head — a “meat chart” for child assault, say critics. You want to search for root causes? Try turning around the microscope.

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Rick Salutin

Rick Salutin is a Canadian novelist, playwright and critic. He is a strong advocate of left wing causes and writes a regular column in the Toronto Star.